Page 19 of Hot Blooded

Back on comfortable footing with each other, Etta changed the topic. “You might be wondering why I came by?”

“Isn’t the pleasure of my company reason enough?” Amos asked, masking his amusement with a dry tone. He knew Etta would find any reason to come by, perhaps more often than Amos would necessarily care for. Not that he didn’t enjoy her visits. She just tended to give no warning and liked to strong-arm Amos into larks he’d rather not be a part of. After more than a century of vampirism, he’d adjusted well to the solitude. He vaguely remembered that even before being turned, he hadn’t exactly been a social butterfly. But, because of his introversion, Etta always showed up with a non-social pretense for her visit.

“Of course it is,” she said, shooting him a look that said she knew exactly what he was doing. “Anyways, I don’t suppose you’ve heard the news about Alex Markov?”

Amos sighed. “What has the fucker done now?”

Alex Markov was possibly the oldest vampire residing in Chicago. Nobody knew his true age. Whatever it was, he was ancient enough to possess powers that most vampires could only dream of attaining. He could resist daysleep. He was known to decorporealize and travel through shadows. It was rumored that he could inhabit dreams and communicate through telepathy. He allegedly had a bloodmate, but it was widely believed that he’d enthralled her rather than won her over through courtship—which was no better than psychic rape, and he probably hadn’t shied away from physical rape, either.

Amos had never met him, for which he was grateful, because nothing good was ever said of him. He was an unstoppable force of corruption and cruelty, and the Council did absolutely nothing to intervene.

“Well, he’s dead.”

Amos’s brows rose. “Who managed that? Did one of the Councilors finally grow a spine?”

“Nope. Werewolves,” Etta said.

Despite the sadistic pleasure of knowing Alex Markov had been wiped off the planet, Amos was alarmed. “Wolves? In the city?” Wolves didn’t usually come into cities—it was one of the reasons that vampires tended to be urban dwellers.

“No, he was killed in Alaska, of all places. The Council only found out about it because one of his thralls was discovered by the Anchorage Council—yes, the monster had been turning thralls, and no, we have no idea how many of the poor things he created. The girl was trying to get to where she’d last felt his pull—somewhere in the interior. Well, except for a desperate thrall, nobody’s stupid enough to go marching into what is obviously wolf territory, so we’ll never know for sure, I suppose. But it seems pretty open and shut at this point.”

“Good riddance. Why should I care what happened to him?”

Etta shrugged. “It’s at least gratifying to know he’s gone, no?”

“Would’ve been more gratifying if the Council had done something about him before he created and abandoned an unknown number of thralls.”

She sighed. “He was one of the oldest vampires in the Western Hemisphere. He was clever and powerful. It would’ve taken the entire Council to take him down, and you know how politics goes with that sort of thing.”

“Sure. People suffer, but as long as it’s not affecting the Councilors personally, then who fucking cares, right?”

“The story of mankind,” Fran said grimly.

Etta squeezed her arm in silent agreement. “Anyway, sireless thralls are a problem for all of us. We need to get them rounded up and sorted out. I’ve already told the Council I would help. You should consider—”

“Of course I’ll help,” Amos said immediately, thinking of the thrall who’d attacked Tessa. Had that been one of Markov’s? And how many more were out there? Tessa worked nights. She’d be out and exposed while a bunch of untethered thralls were loose. Anxiety spiked through him like a knife to his heart. The urge to go back, to keep watch over her was so strong, he was halfway to the front door before he realized what he was doing.

He had promised her that he wouldn’t do that. He had promised. His hands curled into fists. He didn’t want to break his word, but honoring it left him totally helpless to protect her. He couldn’t even call to warn her, because he didn’t have her phone number—a now glaring oversight that should’ve been handled when they’d made their agreement just a few hours earlier.

“Amos?” Etta appeared behind him, her hand landing gently on his arm. “What’s wrong?”

There was nothing for it. He was going to have to break his promise to Tessa. He could rationalize that he was looking for thralls—not her. It was a razor-thin technicality, but he’d take it.

“I have to go,” he said, continuing to the door.

“What, now? The sun’s coming up in two hours!”

“I’ll be safe, I promise. But I have to go.” And then he was out the door, Etta’s objection ringing after him.

He took a position on the rooftop of the hospice. He could see approachers from every direction, and with the way the wind eddied through the buildings, he’d have a good chance of picking up a thrall’s scent before they came into sight.

Knowing that he could protect Tessa put his mind at ease, even if guilt prickled at him. He settled in and watched.

The rest of the night passed without any thralls appearing. Above the lights of the city, the sky began to subtly lighten. The untethered thralls would be hunkered down in their daysleep, no longer a danger until sunset. Amos shifted to leave but froze when, below, the employees’ door banged open. A group of people emerged, chatting in the cheerfully exhausted way people at the end of their shift usually did. Amos crouched near the edge of the roof, hidden in the shadow of a turbine vent, and peered intently at them. Tessa wasn’t among them.

He waited for the humans to disperse so he could discreetly leave the roof. The dawn’s brightness was beginning to burn at his skin. Daysleep tugged at his mind, but he blinked and resisted it. The sky continued to grow lighter. Amos pulled his hood further forward. Just when he was going to cross the roof, the door below banged open again, and he heard the sound of her voice.

“—hate when it comes to that, but what else are we supposed to do?” Tessa said tiredly.

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